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Get more patients by perfecting your dental practice brand

Brand & Branding… now is the time to take control!

When you go into any business – a shop, a restaurant or perhaps a dental practice, how long does it take you to make a judgement? How long does it take for that unqualified, sub-conscious gut feeling to get a hold? Five or ten seconds? Sometimes even less.

In today’s full on, multi-media, message heavy society we, as consumers are making decisions on thinner and thinner slices of information – it’s a coping mechanism designed to weedle out the noise, so we can concentrate on what’s important to us. If you don’t believe me, answer this question…

Q. In the last month, have you thrown away a letter without opening it?

Thin slicing!

And that’s exactly what your potential new patients are doing when they land on your web page, when they contact you by phone or call into your practice. They’re making instant judgments on your practice, your culture, your personality…your brand. More often than not, those gut feelings are pretty accurate and, more importantly, those gut feelings are believed and acted upon.

You see, your brand is not what you think it is, it’s what your customers and prospective customers think it is. Ask Volkswagen…and they’ll confirm that.

Your dental practice has a brand, whether you think it has or not – if it’s easier, think of your brand as your reputation.

The question is…is your brand something you are in control of, something that every member of staff understands and buys into, something that is designed, cultivated and nurtured…or is it just what it happens to be?

For most dental practices that I’ve met, the answer is the latter. Which means, for those practices that are prepared to be proactive and approach brand and branding as a strategic differentiator, there is a huge opportunity to steal a march on the competition.

In my next article I’ll show you how you can do just that and as a result, boost your treatment uptake and improve your team morale and performance.

Download our dental practice branding guide

Les is the Marketing Director at Practice Plan and has over thirty years' experience of working within the creative and dental sectors in the fields of design, marketing and strategic consultancy.
Les is an experienced facilitator and speaker with a reputation for his creativity and fresh-thinking in business. He is also a published author, professional photographer and the creator and editor of The Business of Dentistry Magazine.
Key areas of expertise: Communication, design and branding, Marketing and the customer journey, Strategic planning and Idea generation.